I'll chime in here and mention that I've recently begun a lute with a bowl made of lightly-figured Swiss Pear. This is the first time I've used it for a lute bowl. I sourced and purchased a seasoned 'slab' of pear tree, enough for four lute bowls, six lute necks, and numerous bridges and pegs. In density and hardness (and behavior) it seems closest to Big Leaf Maple. Bending has so far been fairly easy, with the usual care needed when bending figured wood. It'll be a while before the results are audible, but so far it's been pleasant and stable to work with.
I did some tests on scraps of this wood for the finish. I found that with an oil varnish the finish is very nice, but looks a little bit 'dirty'. French polishing with shellac has produced very beautiful results - looks cleaner and there's a bit more visual pop of the figure than with the oil varnish. I'm using holly spacers between the pearwood ribs. With finish applied the color of the pear is a delicious warm red brown which contrasts well with the holly spacers. It's definitely tricky to source the figured wood in dimensions large enough to cut into lute ribs - I was very fortunate to find a piece that was a little over six feet in length x 19" wide x 14/4 in thickness. But oh so worth it. If anyone needs the source I got my pearwood from, please let me know offlist and I'll be happy to give you their contact info. I believe they have at least one more slab near the dimensions of the one I bought. Alfred in the Bay Area ----- Original Message ---- From: David Brown <[email protected]> To: Timothy Motz <[email protected]> Cc: [email protected] Sent: Tue, May 8, 2012 6:21:57 AM Subject: [LUTE-BUILDER] Re: What about pear wood? Hello Timothy and Alexandros, I would tend to disagree that steamed Swiss pear is more dense and harder than hard maple. I would describe it as closer to a softer maple but with different qualities and specifications support this. I would describe it as a very "creamy" wood with a very fine grain and an absolute (no pun intended) pleasure to work and carve. It is a fairly stable wood. You can find it with a wavy figure and sometimes slightly curly. I use it regularly and it makes a very nice lute bowl. It is easy to find, but be sure you don't get "Australian" pear as I've seen it listed. This is much harder to work than Swiss pear. Pear from the US is harder to find, but is also a wonderful wood. I have a whole trees worth that was cut from a 19c. farm site that was destined to be terra-formed by the interstate system. As a somewhat obtuse historic reference, the Este harp which was built around 1581 has some parts made of pear and others of curly maple. Many rosette makers use it as the carved "frame" for the parchment and wood rosettes. At one point, many makers used it for pegs. It was often used for blocks for prints. Sincerely and respectfully, David David B. Brown, Luthier -----Original Message----- From: [email protected] [mailto:[email protected]] On Behalf Of Timothy Motz Sent: Tuesday, May 08, 2012 8:27 AM To: Alexandros Tzimeros Cc: [email protected] Subject: [LUTE-BUILDER] Re: What about pear wood? Alex, Pear is both denser and harder than hard maple, so it would make a fine bowl for a lute. I don't know how easily it bends, but since Mustafa says it's used for ouds, it must bend decently. The one time I used it was for a flat-backed instrument, so I didn't have to bend it. It took forever to sand it down to the proper thickness on my little sander, but it certainly helped project the sound. I think it's used a lot for wooden flutes and recorders. I would think the reasons it's not used more is because it doesn't have much of a figure and isn't as dramatic looking as the tropical hardwoods and at least in the US it's rather scarce and expensive. There are no old-growth rain forests of European pear to clear-cut. I've never seen it in my local hardwood dealer's stock. The pear that I used was from Luthier's Mercantile and I've never seen it in their list of available back and side woods since that one time. Tim On May 8, 2012, at 2:04 AM, Alexandros Tzimeros wrote: > Hi dear all, > > after sorting out the disadvantages of mahogany in lute construction, > can we discuss about pearwood? It is a wood that I rarely see being used in lutes. > The point is that I like it a lot but I'm a bit hesitant to use it. > Any opinions? > > Thanks, > Alex > > > To get on or off this list see list information at > http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html
